The Man in the Hat | article | LAPD: Get Out of My Crime Scene

   "This is the City, Los Angeles, California." That's the way actor, Jack Webb introduced the 1960's campy cop drama, "Dragnet." There have been interesting relationships between cameras and the Los Angeles Police Department throughout the years. Like any long-term relationship, the pendulum of love and hate has swung at varying oscillations.

   Recently, I was dispatched without a reporter to cover a shooting along the Harbor Freeway in South Central. I attempted two approaches to get close to the scene and was rebuffed both times. "Get out of my crime scene," bellowed one uniformed officer, though I was clearly far from any such area.

   It has been my recent anecdotal experience that law enforcement, especially the LAPD, has made it a practice to put the press perimeter far away from any crime scene whenever possible. Looking back, we have seen period movies depicting photographers traipsing through blood stained floors. I am glad that forensic science has improved and respect the need to secure evidence. My question is simply why must we, the Fourth Estate, be restricted to no view at all while citizens are allowed free access?

   A disclaimer here: This is all conjecture on my part. I have no sources. Whenever I have tried to engage an officer in off-the-record conversation, I hear only the party line. Nevertheless, I point to one event that changed much of how the police, the courts, and the news media have conducted themselves and interacted with each other: O.J. Simpson.

   Every television station and network in this town fell over each other to put a microscope over this celebrity case. For over a year, file tape of the crime scene investigators washed across TV monitors. News organizations' budgets were busted. (I remember referring to the defendant as "O.T." Simpson due to all the overtime pay we all were collecting.) The defense "Dream Team" used some of the footage to poke enough holes in the prosecution case not only to allow the criminal case jury reasonable doubt, but to sully the image of "The Thin Blue Line" as the nation watched.

   Now, it often takes a helicopter or some very creative land angles to get any view of police activity. Photography is virtually prohibited at the downtown Criminal Courts Building. Coincidence? Granted that the police of our fair city have a difficult job to do. They have legitimate duties to secure evidence, protect the rights and privacy of victims, and serve their function in the justice system. The press also has legitimate duties to inform the public, even to serve as a watchdog. It has fallen on our profession to keep an eye on our public servants, even if--or especially when--it could cast them in a bad light. History is loaded with episodes of the problems that grow with unchecked power.